The invention relates to a system for implementing a design for six sigma (DFSS) process. For any application (business, manufacturing, service, etc.), the sigma value is used to indicate variability. A sigma quality level indicates how well a process is performing. The higher the sigma value, the better the output. Sigma measures the capability of the process to perform defect-free-work, wherein a defect is synonymous with customer dissatisfaction. With six sigma the common measurement index is defects-per-unit where a unit can be virtually anythingxe2x80x94a component, a piece part of a jet engine, an administrative procedure, etc. The sigma value indicates how often defects are likely to occur. As sigma increases, customer satisfaction goes up along with improvement of other metrics (e.g., cost and cycle time).
The six sigma methodology has been implemented for specific applications such as semiconductor manufacturing. However, a drawback to these specific applications is that there is a lack of flexibility to allow for the existing implementation to be applied to other applications, such as the manufacturing of a product having multiple operations, each of which affects the performance of another operation.
Moreover, the performance of such operations are sometimes customer sensitive and the performance of one operation is sometimes improved at the expense of the performance of another operation.
An exemplary embodiment of the invention is a system for implementing a design for six sigma process having a plurality of sub-processes each having a plurality of sub-steps. The system includes an independent main application for implementing the design for six sigma process. A series of independent sub-process applications each implements one sub-process of the design for six sigma process.